How to kill fire ants and stop them from living in your lawn

In several
locations around the country, fire ants have become a normal headache in the
summer months as they move in and take over the lawn. They create expanding
mounts that ruin the lawn, but more importantly they create a health risk to
animals and young children. Fire ants are very aggressive ants that attack in
swarms and will bite anything that disturbs their mounds. The damage from their
bites can be as serious as death.

In many
cases the mounds exist in areas that are not frequently traveled on so anyone
can step on a mound and within seconds are bitten. There are no natural predators
to the fire ant in the United States, or in many other places where this ant
can be found, which leaves it to the home owner to learn how to treat and get
rid of fire ants that have showed up on their lawn.

There
are a few ways any home owner can attempt to manage the fire ant issue. The
first thing to understand is that to successfully kill off the fire ants and
get rid of them from your property you need to kill of the queen fire ant. You
can kill hundreds and hundreds of workers, but unless you get the queen it does
not matter. They will grow back and spread.

Here
are a few ways you can attempt to kill off the queen fire ant to get rid of the
fire ants from your property:

1. Deep
within any fire ant mount there are extensive tunnels that exist. In the depths
of these tunnels is where the queen resides. This is why simply just knocking
over the mound or trying to crush it does no good. You need to penetrate deep
within the system. To do this you need to boil a great deal of water and with
the help of a funnel pour all the water into the mound. This scalding hot water
will travel through all of the tunnels and eventually kill off the queen.

2. The
second way to try and get rid of your fire ant issue is to use fire ant bait.
Fire ant bait is spread out around the mound and contains poison. The worker
ants will pick up the bait and bring it to the queen eventually. If the queen
consumes the poison the entire mound will die off shortly after. This is very
effective, but it is not a great option if you have pets or children in the
yard who could be exposed to the bait or accidently consume it.

3. The
last option which does not kill off the fire ants but does remove them from
your property is to constantly treat the problem and keep the ants agitated.
Always mow your lawn each weekend, break up the dirt in the mound, pour water
in the area, etc. Be sure in both the spring and fall to reseed in the areas that
are bare in your yard so that grass comes up. Fire ant mounds typically show up
in yards that are not properly maintained or have areas not commonly traveled
on.

Always
remember when you are treating a fire ant pit you are dealing with aggressive
ants that can hurt you and cause agitations to even adults so you need to use
caution to ensure no one is injured in the process.